The Letter
by lowlypeon626
Summary: He found a letter lying on her floor. He read it. He was happy about it ... but who is it really for? DracoHermione ... possibly HermioneBlaise
1. CH 1 Stairs

**CHAPTER 1 – Stairs**

The portrait of the Head's Dorm slowly opened, and a figure slowly walked in, taking in his surroundings. He walks to the staircase leading to the Head Girl's room and calls out …

"Oi! Granger! Get your lazy bum down here! We're late!"

Draco Malfoy, Head Boy, calls out to his co-Head – arms crossed, brown knitted, foot tapping impatiently. If Draco Malfoy had a watch (or knew what one was), he would've kept looking at it all the while shaking his head and running his fingers through his blonde hair.

_Patience is DEFINITELY not one of my stronger suites. _"Granger! Are you up there? Hermione!!! We're so late, McGonagall's gonna have my head! Will you hurry it up?!!!"

Getting tired of waiting and yelling, Draco marches up the stairs towards Hermione's room, muttering idle threats to her under his breath – just in case she IS in her room, he doesn't want to piss her off and have her hex him for his hollow ramblings – like she did last week.

* * *

_"**Aaargh! I hate Snape right now … partnering me with Granger … bushy bucktooth know-it-all … probably mess up my grades on purpose … drop a dung bomb in my cauldron on purpose … or worse, drop something that'll turn my hair purple and put a wart on my nose …" rants an irate Draco Malfoy to his ever-present goons, Crabbe and Goyle.**_

**_Crabbe and Goyle were nodding their agreement, when they suddenly stopped walking and were just staring at him open-mouthed. Draco stopped and asked them "What?" to which the two just stared and pointed at him._**

_"**Imbeciles" and Draco turns and walks away from them – jogging to catch up with Blaise and Pansy who were walking ahead of them. They bust into hysterical laughter as soon as he caught up with them, making him run into the nearest bathroom – more importantly, mirror.**_

_"_**_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!" A yelling, screaming, near-hysterics Draco Malfoy is seen running out of the bathroom. Funnier than HEARING Draco Malfoy screaming like a girl is SEEING what he looked like screaming like a girl. His hair was purple and he had a wart on his nose – the things he feared would happen with Hermione as his partner. "Granger! I am going to murder you! No! Torture you! A quick and painless death would be an easy out for you … I will chop off your bushy hair and … and … " His threats trailed off as he rounded the corner to catch up to the laughing Gryffindor Golden Trio.__

* * *

_ **

_So she heard me ranting ... big deal … she didn't have to get all carried away and take it a step further! I mean, come on! She already gave me the wart and purple hair, she didn't need to make my face green with yellow polka dots to it!_

"Stupid woman … smartest witch in her generation … can't even keep an appointment … probably still looking for her brush in that bushy head of hers …" his ramblings get cut off as the stairs suddenly folded in and turned into a slide. Seeker instincts kicking in, he grans a hold of the banister for dear life, and hauls himself the rest of the way up.

Finally reaching the top, he looks back down on the stairs/slide he has conquered, looks down on it and goes "HAH! Smartest witch or not, she didn't see that coming!" and turns to her closed door. Grabbing the doorknob, he turns it to open her door, and …

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Disclaimer: Not mine! Not mine! Not mine! Waaaaaaaahhhh!!!!!!! sniff! sniff! sob! … if by this time you still don't know who owns this, then there's something seriously wrong with you! 


	2. CH 2 Shocked

**Chapter 2 - Shocked**

"AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"

Flying across the hall, he hits and slides down the wall opposite her door. Hand and arm tingling, he smells something burnt. He walks to the mirror hanging by her door and looks at his reflection. He raises a tingling hand and arm to wipe his soot covered face and straighten his fizzled (and still crackling) blonde locks.

He looks at the door and starts cursing at it – and her. "Dammit woman!!!!! What's the matter with you?!!!! Are you trying to kill me?!!!"

Not hearing an answer from within, he turns to stomp back down the now returned to normal staircase, and stops – a calculating look on his face. He slowly turns back to Hermione's door and undoes the shocking spell she placed on her doorknob. It took him another 15 minutes to undo all the locking spells she placed on her door, and another 20 to make sure all the booby traps she put on her door undone.

After almost an hour, he finally got her door opened. It was dark inside, indicating that the Head Girl was indeed not in her room – but he kinda figured that out the moment he started flying and didn't hear any laughter coming from her room.

He was about to step in, but stopped and looked suspiciously at the door and the room once again. Not willing to take any chances, he took the vase sitting on the table in hall and threw it into the room. He waited three minutes to see if anything happened to the vase – shock, explosion, a piano dropping down the ceiling on it … _Hey! This is Hermione Granger we're talking about. Anything's possible!_

When nothing happened, he stepped into her room … and green goop fell on him. He stood there in shock before once again cursing her and her paranoid need for security – or her sick sense of humor. Stomping his foot once last time, he reached for his wand to clean himself up and get out of her booby-trapped room. But first … he jumped on her bed and started rolling around on it, getting slime all over her pristine bed.

"There! That'll teach you to slime me!!!" He turned around to leave the room, wand at the ready to clean himself up, when his eyes fell upon something on the floor, half-hidden under bed. Not wanting to chance a conjured monster jumping out at him from under her bed, he looked around the room for something long to grab at it. Finding nothing that didn't look suspicious, he got down on all fours, leaned his body away from the bed as far as he could, and used his foot to drag the letter away from the bed to a safe distance where he could pick it up. Actually, there were a lot of things he could've used – an umbrella, a decorative lance (_what would that be doing in here?_), the fireplace poker …

_Yeah right! I'm not chancing whatever ingenious spells she put on those things._

Looking at the folded piece of paper, he wondered what it was. Debating on opening it or not, in case it was yet another trap, a paper filled with hexes waiting to be unleashed once opened. But he wasn't Draco Malfoy for nothing …

He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, opened the letter and …

Disclaimer: Not mine! Not mine! Not mine! Waaaaaaaahhhh!!!!!!! sniff! sniff! sob! … if by this time you still don't know who owns this, then there's something seriously wrong with you!


	3. CH 3 Letter

**Chapter 3 – The Letter**

_I'm still alive … Nothing happened._

He slowly opened his eyes one at a time, and looked at the letter – suspicions not wavering a bit. He opened the paper all the way and saw that it was a letter. Figuring that it was a love letter, Draco had no qualms skimming through it …

_**It's strange … I don't understand it myself … you're not what I expected … can't believe this is happening … this can't be … we'll never be … too different … different worlds … Slytherin and Gryffindor … Pureblood and Mudblood … **_

At this, Draco's eyes widened. His heart started beating faster … _It can't be. No, it can't be. Please let this be true … let this be … _He continued skimming through a love letter written by Hermione.

_**I don't understand you … don't know … not well enough … you don't like me … hate my friends … an enigma … something I can't even begin to comprehend … secretly … watch over you … protect you … with my whole heart … I love you … but I can't find the words to say … never knew … feel this way … someday … feel the same …**_

At these words, he released the breath he didn't know he was holding. All these years of tormenting her, making fun of her friends, how can this be? Can she really be harboring feelings for me? Can it really be that she loves me? It has to be … its right here in black and white … she loves me …

But before he could contemplate what this revelation could mean for the both of them, he hears the common room door open, and just before it slams shut, he hears the concerned portrait saying "Don't slam me …" before a furious Hermione Granger yells "DRACO MALFOY!!! Where the bloody hell are you, you slimy git!!!! Get your pasty arse here before I …"

Wondering why Hermione stopped at mid-rant, Draco scrambles to get up when he hears her running up the staircase, only managing to jam the letter in his pocket a split second before she appeared in her doorway.

Eyes in slits, she scans her room – taking note of the state of her bed – until her gaze fell upon the Head Boy. Taking in his appearance – blonde hair sticking out all over the place and soot in his hair and face from the shock, dried slime all over his body, purple marks on his face, horns on his forehead, and a pink dot right between his eyes from some of the curses that hit him from trying to unlock her door – her lips started twitching in an upward curve until she pursed her lips trying to stem the mirth that was so obvious in her eyes.

Shaking herself and trying to keep her amusement in check, she stares the Head Boy down, takes in a deep breath before resuming her tirade …

"Where in Merlin's beard have you been? I mean, is it too much to ask for you to SHOW UP for a meeting with Prof. McGonagal and the Prefects? I mean, honestly, what kind of impression are you leaving the Prefects? You ARE Head Boy, you need to set an example. Now the Prefects will think that its ok to ditch a meeting based on your example …"

This snapped Draco out of his shock at almost being caught reading her love letter to – he assumed – HIM. _McGonagal … meeting … show up …_then it hit him …

"Holy Crap! I missed the meeting!!!!!" yelled Draco, going into a rant of his own.

Hermione stopped in mid-rant at his outburst. She gave him a strange look and slowly walked towards Draco. She stopped right in front of him, arm across her chest, supporting her other arm, with her hand under her chin, watching the pacing/ranting Malfoy like a hawk, catching the end of his ranting.

"… and it's all YOUR fault!" Malfoy finishes with a flourish, pointing at Hermione, finger close to touching her nose. Not wanting to show that he startled her, Hermione blinks twice, takes a step back, and stomps her foot on Draco's. With a HMP and a swish of her robes, she walks out of her room …

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Disclaimer: Not mine! Not mine! Not mine! Waaaaaaaahhhh!!!!!!! sniff! sniff! sob! … if by this time you still don't know who owns this, then there's something seriously wrong with you! 


	4. CH 4 Argument

**Chapter 4 – The Argument**

"Where do you think you're going Granger?!" Draco yells after Hermione, and runs out after her … and he goes flying over the threshold and hits his face on the wall with an OOOMPH.

Grabbing a hold of his throbbing head and face, he shakes himself trying to figure out just what happened. _I couldn't have possibly tripped on air …_ and then he heard the laughter. The hysterical, uncontrolled laughter of a bushy haired Gryffindor. He glared daggers at her and wondered about her sanity, just as he realized he DIDN'T trip on air. _She tripped me! SHE TRIPPED ME!!!_ Hermione in turn just kept on laughing all the way down the stairs.

"If this is how you show your love for me, I wonder what you'd do to me if you hated me …" muttering under his breath and pushing himself up off the floor and following her down to the Common Room.

He found her lounging on the couch - reading as usual. He walks up to her and yanks her book from her hands with a growl. With reflexes a Seeker would envy, she whips out her want and points it right between his eyes. Draco was too proud to lower his gaze, or give the book back, and Hermione is equally as proud and stubborn and refuses to lower her wand until her precious book was returned to her.

This was how Blaise Zabini found the two.

"Um, did I come at a bad time Draco?" Blaise hesitantly asks Draco, who just grunts a response but doesn't look at him, keeping the ongoing staring down contest with Hermione.

Blaise looked from one to the other, from Hermione's glare, to Draco's seemingly nonchalant attitude, back and forth, back and forth, seeing who of the two will give in first. Until a slight movement from Hermione's wand arm caught his attention. Being in the same classes as Hermione, as well as the Slug Club, Blaise knew how amazing, and deadly, a dueler Hermione is. He knew what to look for. The slight tightening of her hand on her wand was an indication that Draco was about to be hit with something he didn't want to be hit with.

"Granger!" Blaise calls out to her in hopes of distracting her. Hermione kept looking at Draco and just raised her eyebrows as an acknowledgement she heard him. This encouraged Blaise to continue. Thinking fast, he thought about what would distract Hermione enough to take her attention away from Draco, and not cursing him to oblivion.

"Granger … what exactly did the stupid prat do this time? From the look on your face – and his – he pulled another infamously stupid Draco Malfoy stunt."

That did the trick. Both Hermione and Draco turned to him – Hermione in amusement and Draco in indignation. The slight smirk on Hermione's face and a slightly raised eyebrow showed him that she knew what he was doing. Draco, on the other hand, took at as a blow to his esteemed ego and was sputtering with indignation at his best friend.

"Wha --- How --- Granger --- prat ---"

"Draco, coherent sentences … complete thought, please. It's hard enough to understand you and your twisted brain without having to decipher your ramblings" Blaise told him in an amused tone.

Draco snapped his mouth shut, glared at his best friend, closed his eyes, shook his head and rolled his shoulders as an athlete would when relaxing himself, and opened his eyes with a clam, cool demeanor befitting a Malfoy.

In his best 'I-am-Draco-Malfoy-I-Am-Better-Than-You' voice, Draco explains to Blaise, "Blaise, mate, I don't think you fully understand the complexities of my –er- _relationship_ with Granger here –"

"That's because we _have none_, you stupid albino ferret!"

"- but let me assure you that this whole fiasco had nothing to do with me, and everything to do with Bushy over here."

"_BUSHY!!!_ I'll show you _Bushy_ you pompous, arrogant, conceited … oomph! Blaise, let me go … lemme just sock him once, maybe knock some teeth out and some sense into his Royal Pain …" says an irate Hermione wiggling in the arms of Blaise while trying to grab at Draco – who nimbly stepped away.

"Calm down Gryff!!!! Let the pompous arse finish his rambling so we can all get on with our lives!"

"Fine … I'll let him finish … but I make no promises as to what I'll do to him when he's done" and sits on the couch in a huff. Blaise follows suit and sits right beside Hermione – a little too close, Draco notices. His eyes flash a steely grey that doesn't go unnoticed by Blaise.

"As I was saying" continues Draco "_your_ precious _Gryff _here" his voice takes on a steely edge at this statement "started this whole mess. She barges in here like she owns the whole place," Blaise grabs Hermione and keeps her in place, "and starts verbally and physically abusing me like I'm some sort of commoner, better yet, as if I were her _equal_."

At this, Hermione gasps and Blaise looks dumbfounded as they both know that Draco was beyond all that now. Hermione opens her mouth to say something in retaliation, but Draco puts his hand up to stop her and says "I'm not done yet."

"I was just doing my Head Boy-ly duties and was looking for an errant Head Girl who was so very late for a meeting with our esteemed Prof. McGonagal. She wasn't down here, so I called for her, assuming she was up in her room tangled up in what she calls _hair."_

"Granger, sit **still! **Draco,** move on!**" And Draco goes on to recount his _mis_adventures in trying to locate the Head Girl.

" … and that's when you showed up. So, as you can tell, mate, this whole fiasco was her fault."

"…"

"…"

"What? You don't agree?" Draco asked when the two didn't say anything. Hermione just groaned and put her face in her hands. Blaise just continued to stare at Draco as if he had suddenly grown two heads.

"Draco, mate, you DID listen to yourself as you were re-telling your story, right?"

"Of course I did, and … ?"

"Mate, you just admitted that you forced your way up her stairs, broke through her wards and entered her room without her permission."

"Well, she wasn't there for me to ask permission …" Draco responded, eliciting a very unladylike snort from Hermione.

"All the more reason for you NOT to have gone in! Geez … do the muggle term 'Breaking and Entering' and 'Felony' mean anything to you?"

"Errrr … well, when you put it THAT way, of course it sounds bad! But you're missing my point entirely."

"Which is?" Both Blaise and Hermione said at the same time.

"That I had good intentions. I was worried about Bushy over here and thought that she might be in some kind of trouble. You know, being late for the meeting and all, since she's NEVER late for these sort of things …"

"You imbecile, I was not LATE for the meeting! I was 15 minutes early and Prof. McGonagal sent me to go get Prof. Flitwick as our next project will involve his help!"

Draco shrugged. "So it was honest mistake. You can hardly blame me for that, now can you Bushy?"

Hermione fumed and Blaise stifled a laugh. "First of all, stop calling me Bushy! I have a name and you will call me by that. No, scratch that, call be my last name. Only my friends are allowed to call my by my first name. **Secondly**," Hermione stresses as she sees Draco about to object "YOU missed the meeting because you were too busy breaking into my room **AND** nosing aroung **AND **leaving it a mess. So, please, pray tell what exactly were you looking for in my room for you to be so stupid and careless as to stay in there and actually get caught?"

Draco was at a loss for words and looked to Blaise for some help. "She's got you there mate," Blaise tells his friend helplessly.

"Well, I –uh- look, can we just drop it already? Like I said, honest mistake. How was I to know if someone was in there choking the life out of her? Merlin knows I would," the last part muttered under his breath.

"I heard that!"

"Ok! Ok! So I got caught up trying to break her wards. I must admit, her wards are a challenge. Once I got started, I couldn't stop until I broke through. Plus, I honestly got a certain satisfaction being able to successfully break through Bushy's wards."

"I know what you mean mate. What? C'mon Gryff, your curses are nasty, and very few people can get past your wards, so I definitely know where Draco's coming from."

"Fine. That doesn't explain why he rudely took my book from me while I was reading it," glaring at Malfoy.

"Well, that doesn't explain why she maliciously caused me bodily harm!" glaring right back at Hermione.

Blaise went in between the two Heads with his arms raised to stop them both from coming any closer to each other. "Whoa, whoa, WHOA!!! What do you mean 'maliciously caused you bodily harm'?" Blaise asked looking from Hermione to Draco.

"If by 'maliciously causing you bodily harm' you mean I tripped you, yeah, I did! And it was NOT uncalled for. I believe you deserved that and each and every effect of my curses."

What happened next was the last thing anyone expected to happen …

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Disclaimer: Not mine! Not mine! Not mine! Waaaaaaaahhhh!!!!!!! sniff! sniff! sob! … if by this time you still don't know who owns this, then there's something seriously wrong with you! 


	5. CH 5 Reading

**Chapter 5 – The Reading**

Blaise and Hermione were staring dumbfounded at Draco Malfoy. Draco Malfoy, Slytherin Prince. Draco Malfoy, Heir to the Malfoy forture. Draco Malfoy, poster child for pureblooded elitists. Draco Malfoy, arrogance, ego and pride rolled into one. Draco Malfoy, Mr. Elegance Extraordinaire.

The very same Draco Malfoy who was rolling on the floor, clutching his sides, laughing and hooting in a very undignified manner not befitting the Malfoy name.

Hermione and Blaise look from each other, to Draco, back to each other again. "Well, I think your friend's lost it Blaise."

"Yah, I think you're right Gryff."

"Think he'll surface anytime soon?"

"… doesn't look like it."

"…"

"…"

"Well, I'm outta here. Merlin knows if what Malfoy has is catching."

"I'm with you Gryff … let's go."

Hermione and Blaise take one last incredulous look at Malfoy – who was still laughing hysterically – and turned and left the Heads' Room.

As soon as the two left, Draco immediately stopped laughing, stood up and brushed himself off. He looked at the door the two left from with a frown, closed his eyes and sighed. He walked to the couch and plopped down on it. Throwing his arms over the back of the couch, he tilted his head back and looked at the ceiling … thinking. Thinking about the past few hours. Thinking about the seemingly easy camaraderie between Blaise and Hermione, and how he seemed to be bothered by it.

_Bothered by it? Why would I be bothered by it? It's not like I'm into her or anything like that. __**She's **__the one into __**ME.**_

And with that, he remembered the letter … he pulled out the crumpled letter and read it.

_**It's strange**__, what I'm feeling, even more so because I'm feeling it for you. You probably wouldn't understand. Even__** I don't understand it myself**__. We hardly know each other. We weren't even friends for most of our time here at Hogwarts. To you, I was the know-it-all Gryfindor, Harry Potter's best friend, and a mudblood to boot. To me, you were another arrogant Slytherin, a blind prejudiced pureblooded prat. But that's changed. We've changed, the war has seen to that. You finally saw Voldemort and your family for what they were – power-hungry madmen that cared for no one but the power they would lord over other people. You turned you back on them and joined us – that was a shock for everyone. People thought it was a trap, but you proved them – us – wrong. You worked with us. Worked with me.__** You're not what I expected **__and that surprised me. You were better than I thought, and working with you made me realize how severely I misjudged you. I started to admire you – your wits under pressure, your pride under doubt and scrutiny, your calm under all the hostility towards you – your sheer desire to not become what your family expects of you, striving to do what you could to make things – and yourself – better, in spite of all the obstacles and suspicion. I admired you, and slowly started falling for you. I __**can't believe this is happening**__, me falling in love with a Slytherin, someone we considered to be one of our hated enemies. I know that __**this can't be**__, it shouldn't be, __**we'll never be**__ together. It can't happen. We're just far __**too different**__. We come from __**different worlds**__, a__** Slytherin and Gryffindor**__ – centuries of bad blood between our houses. A __**Pureblood and Mudblood**__ – again with the blood. Will we ever get over that?_

_**I don't understand you**__, you're an enigma. You're so proud and arrogant, yet you showed such compassion during the war that I don't think anyone has ever seen. I__** don't know **__your way of thinking, what makes you tick, I don't know YOU, __**not well enough**__ for me to be falling for you, yet I am. I know __**you don't like me**__ I know you __**hate my friends**__, Merlin knows they hate you with an even bigger passion than you hate them. You're __**an **__enigma, you're someone I try to figure out, but can't. Your actions something__** I can't even begin to comprehend**__. I __**secretly **__watch you, I __**watch over you**__ even you think the world has turned its back on you. I __**protect you **__and defend you even when you think that each and everyone of us are against you. I believe in you __**with my whole heart**__**I love you **__in spite of everything we've been through. I want you to know that I'm here for you – been here for you __**but I can't find the words to say**__ to reassure you and comfort you for all that you have lost. I __**never knew **__I would sympathize with a Slytherin. I never knew I would __**feel this way **__about YOU. I'm not expecting anything, least of all you feeling the same way about me. I just hope that __**someday **__you and I can at least put the past and blood behind us ane be friends. I don't expect you__** feel the same**__, but I can always hope._

_Hermione Granger_

He looked at her hand writing. He loved the way her handwriting curves. He loved how she signed her name. He wonders how his name would look in her hand writing. He figured it would look great in her cursive. He looks uncrumples the top part of the parchment, and what he sees takes his breath away …

* * *

_**Your Letter by 112**_

_I saw a letter lying on the floor  
I couldn't help but look inside  
Thought it was something that you must've left  
Left there for me to find  
All your words were on that page  
All my dreams came true that day  
I found _

Chorus:  
Your letter...  
Your letter...  
It said you loved me  
But you didn't know the words to say  
It said you never knew that you could ever feel this way  
It said you only wish someday that I would feel the same  
In your letter  
Your letter

I guess it just never occured to me  
That you would feel the way I did  
You kept the sweetest secret from my heart  
You kept those feelings in  
Though you never showed a sign  
Give a clue to what I'd find  
Inside

Chorus

I was so happy that I almost cried  
To think that you would think of me that way  
It's like you took my sweetest dream  
And made that dream come true  
I would be with you  
Always...

I saw a name I didn't recognize  
I felt the tears come to my eyes  
Seeing that the love that you've been longing for  
Was another love, not mine  
No, you never showed a sign  
But it was right there in the lines  
Inside

Your letter  
Your letter  
It said you loved him  
But you didn't know the words to say  
It said you never knew that you could ever feel this way  
It said you only wish someday that he would feel the same  
In your letter  
Your letter

I saw a letter lying on the floor...

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Disclaimer: Not mine! Not mine! Not mine! Waaaaaaaahhhh!!!!!!! sniff! sniff! sob! … if by this time you still don't know who owns this, then there's something seriously wrong with you!


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